Naked Mole Rat

I don't want any more new signing this winter, either. Deadline signings are usually hugely overpaid and not well thought out enough.

Well, he's going to have to work hard if he's to succeed at Chelsea. I heard he had some attitude issue at Bolton.

I know we haven't been scoring many goals recently, but I don't think we could have won that match better than we did today with that "soft" penalty (deja vu much?) and 20 minutes of frustrating (from QPR's perspective) time wasting and all that. But if we're going to do that, we should still make sure we're fully concentrated and disciplined. Luiz had a good game in general, but his discipline was shocking as usual, and I'd like to see better use of the ball from Torres as well. There's no need for him to try beat three QPR players from halfway line when the whole team is trying to sit back and comfortably see the game out.

I bet Evans and Ferdinand will love that home kit. Nice little target.

Okay, I'll pay close attention to him next couple games. Hopefully you're right although as of now I don't agree with you at all.

Hardly. Even when he's one of our better players, he's nothing more than decent. The only thing he's been doing well is working hard (probably out of desperation more than anything else). Other than that, he hasn't done much right. He can't dribble past one defender, he can't hold the ball up like Drogba and he's pretty static for the most part. If he was close to completion and only lacked finish, he would be way more prolific than he is now, as he would be able to create more chances for himself.

I know this is trivial, but just wanted to say that the Popular Tags thing looks just amazing. I literally sat spinning the thing around for five minutes.

The World's best Goalkeeper of the Quarter of a Century (1987-1911) 1. Gianluigi Buffon Italia 226 2. Iker Casillas España 213 3. Edwin van der Sar Nederland 201 4. Peter Schmeichel Danmark 179 5. Oliver Kahn Deutschland 162 6. Petr Čech Česká Republika 154 7. José Luis Félix Chilavert Paraguay 146 8. Walter Zenga Italia 132 Andoni Zubizarreta España 132 10. Claudio André Mergen Taffarel Brasil 130 http://www.iffhs.de/?388d85ff8b00388f05f4cbc0385fdcdc3bfcdc0aec70aeedb88419

I keep seeing arguments about how Torres isn't used to our style of play, but I don't think that's a valid excuse at all. The team shouldn't revolve around Torres, and in fact, it's the player who needs to fit in with the rest of the team. We can't afford to change the whole team so that he can perform better. And quite frankly, even if we brought players like Gerrard, Alonso and Kuyt, he would still be shit. It's not like his ex-teammates had this powerful aura or whatever that guided Torres' shots goalward or that one of his current teammates is a practitioner of dark magic that prevents him from scoring. It's simple: Torres can't score (and plays shit in general) because he is a significantly worse player than he used to be, and I don't think he'll improve much from here.

I know nothing of him, but he must be really good since there are over 100 people reading this thread atm.

Thanks, guys.

How good is he exactly? Is he any better than Kalou or Malouda yet? If he is, we should loan those two to Genk instead. I think it'll be a win-win deal. Just kidding. No disrespect to Genk. But, seriously though, if we do get him, will it be better to loan him out or to keep him?

Gower - 5 assists, 35 chances; Mata - 7 assists, 63 chances? Swansea have one of the worse offensive records in the league, too. That's just sad.

I think he's English. Born in Reading.

-------------------Cech---------------- Ivanovic----Luiz------Terry----Cole -------------------Romeu-------------- ------------Ramires---Lampard---- Sturridge------Torres----------Mata We had to field our best team against Portsmouth because that game was really THAT important. Don't expect Cahill, Hutchinson, Bertrand, or Lukaku to start Saturday, people.

Incredible. To think that he was only 21, 22 years old when this happened. It's a shame how the big guys in the media never talk about stuff like this.

That was just one incident. Aside from that, Malouda had a pretty good game against Norwich and worked especially well with Mata. If I'm not mistaken, he was the one who set up Mata with a really good chance in the second half and a couple other. Not that I'm trying to defend him or want him here any longer, but give him some credit. He can be a useful player at times.

If service to Torres was twice as good, he'd score twice as many goals, which is still like nothing.

They plan to take out YNWA from their emblem? THANK GOD LOL everything about this jersey is shit LOVE IT

Clean sheets: 1. Man U [11] 2. Swansea [9] 3. Tottenham, Man C, Newcastle, Liverpool [8] 7. Arsenal, Stoke [7] 9. Chelsea, Sunderland, Fulham [6] 12. Aston Villa [5] 13. Everton, West Brom, QPR [4] 16. Wigan [2] 17. Norwich, Bolton, Wolves [1] 20. Blackburn [0] On top of that, we've only scored 7 goals in our last 7 league games, and of those 7 teams we played against, only Tottenham was a strong side. On top of THAT, we've been shut out three times this season so far: vs Stoke, vs QPR and vs Norwich all of them AWAY from home. Notice how all of these teams are supposedly relatively weaker sides in the league. And it's not just stats. Swansea's a very coherent team, and many of their players are both tactically and positionally aware, especially their two centre backs, Monk and Williams.

This is exactly what I'm talking about. Nobody in their right mind will say we have a great squad, but you make no effort whatsoever to give players credit they deserve. Maybe some of us do tend to overrate some of our players, but that doesn't give you a right to be hypercritical of them. And with all due respect, fuck off with your sarcasm.

Well put. He's been constantly and unnecessarily bashing some of our better and more determined players, namely Ramires, and I can't see what the point of this following line is: Even if you consider the context, it's a pretty unnecessary and ridiculous thing to say. In bold, too.

Malouda. For once he wasn't being selfish, and he seemed to increase our build-up speed when he replaced Lampard. I think it goes to show that we need more pacy midfielders.

That converts to something like 80 passes in 90 minutes. Holy carp.

Well, yeah, I did mention that the Spanish system's better, and you're right with the current system in England being inadequate for youth development and that situations can be improved by incorporating the reserves league with a lower division, but that's irrelevant. My point was that instead of having players go through a cumbersome process of: 1. do well at youth level, 2. do well in reserves, 3. do well in a lower division, 4. have a storming loan spell at a reasonably strong team, and then finally saying "Ok, looks like you've developed well enough, and your presence in the first team no longer threatens the existence of this club, so it's now okay for you to play for us", we should right away give first-team opportunities to those who perform well in the reserves.